Aussie Tourist Contracts Rare Deadly Disease In Thailand

Travel

Posted on August 21, 2017

Usually when we go on holidays to overseas countries, especially developing ones, we prepare ourselves with a number of different vaccines and medications to make sure that we don't get sick while we're meant to be relaxing.

But that doesn't mean that you shouldn't be at all cautious and careful while actually on the trip!

One Sydney man known as Pat learned the hard way after he had been partying the night away at one of Thailand's infamous Full Moon Parties on the island of Koh Phangan.

The IT worker happened to step on a piece of glass while in bare feet, and the shard became wedged in his foot.

Not wanting to ruin his holiday, the man made one huge mistake...and this was that he didn't bother to do anything about the cut, and actually left the piece of glass in his foot for four or five days!!!

And while the glass was lodged in his skin, it became infected with the rare and deadly disease, diphtheria, while Pat remained completely unaware that anything was wrong.

Speaking to News Corp he said, "It got bigger, and bigger, and bigger. I ignored it, as lots of young men would do, and I came home with it."

It wasn't until two weeks after the incident and when the cut had grown to the size of his thumb, that Pat's father was able to convince him to seek medical attention.

The next day he received confirmation that he was infected with the bacterial disease that can cause severe inflammation of the nose, throat and windpipe.

Pat was given five different injections to fight the disease as well as a cream to use on the wound and luckily, a few days later, he began to heal.

"I've got this awesome scar on my foot from the massive hole that was in there at some stage - it was a little bit bigger than my thumb. I seemed to be OK from then on," he said.

Diphtheria was quite common way back in the 1900s but it was thankfully eradicated in Australia in 1950 due to the development of vaccines.

However, the disease still infects a wide number of people in developing countries such as Thailand.

Let this be a lesson to everyone out there to get any cut, big or small, checked while travelling. You never know what nasty infection could make its way into your body!